personal spacecraft
2022 October

Within a decade of its conception, Apollo 11 delivered two men to the moon with the help of over 400,000 personnel and over the equivalent of (100 billion USD in 2022). Against the cold vacuum of space, spacesuits are equipped with liquid cooling systems, heaters, pressured gas, communication devices, and electronic systems to regulate and maintain homeostasis.

Once again this year, Seattle inhales the effects of wildfires across Washington State. Cross-country practice is canceled. Residents are cautioned against outdoor activity. Smoke-sensitive individuals stay indoors, in controlled environments whose walls shield occupants from toxic chemicals and particulate matter. Ideally they own air purifiers. Some already do; one natural disaster has prepared us for another. There's a small satisfaction in the transferability of preparedness against general sickness, that donning a Covid-era N95 might alleviate a smoke-inflicted headache.

For the health-conscious, a nighttime walk in Seattle now features a surgical mask to protect against smoke particles and a light jacket to protect against the light chill in the air. If distant car wheels on asphalt and snippets of conversation are not quite the sound ambience our pedestrian would like to experience, headphones are an option. This lifeline to comfortable music, friends and family, and interesting podcasts amongst the aforementioned necessities reassures our intrepid pedestrian that the nighttime excursion will be safe from boredom -- even, daresay, enjoyable.

Some find such expeditions so enjoyable, in fact, that they make a weekend out of it. And even, daresay, a week? A life-long passion?

For the backpacker, more preparation is necessary. Food for days, gallons of water or a means to purify water on the trail -- in the latter case, routes must be pre-planned, hydration destinations found, marked, and targeted. An easily constructible and destructible shelter, a sleeping bag, cookware, maps. A strategy for encountering unexpected wildlife. And for the most dire situations, an emergency communicator that will reach society where typical wireless carriers won't, costing thousands, and likely thousands more for any rescue effort required -- yet a small price to pay for a life.

And what life is maintained with hundreds of billions of dollars? One may walk the moon. Let's speak of skin, our own, light jackets, external water purification backpacking necessities, shoes --

We all wear our personal spacecraft. Some we are born with, some constructed with the resources immediately available to us, some created with the help of innumerable others. We surround ourselves with armor -- emotional, physical, otherwise. The squealing of buses softened by noise-canceling headphones. Shoes to protect against rough ground, foreign sharp objects, foreign dirt. My hippie friends incline towards going barefoot whenever possible, and to me this yells "there is no foreign, I am one with the world."